How many tins of hammerite does it take to spray a frame?

Northwind

Got my old steelie rigid back to bare metal, I've chickened out of my 2K-clearcoat-on-metal plan as I can't be bothered to polish up the clear, and I don't fancy paying for powdercoat just now... So, hammerite it is. Smooth Yellow to be precise, because I am smooth. And yellow. But I'm just wondering how many 400ml cans I'll need, I've never used this particular paint before so I don't know how it covers. Can't find any locally so I need to mail order, so I don't want to have to get a second can halfway through...

Cheers

schweiz

According to their website 400ml will cover 0.5 sq m (i.e. 50cm x 1m) when sprayed.

http://www.icipaints.co.uk/products/inf ... finish.jsp

Depends if you want to do more than on coat. They recommend at least two coats. Add up (circumference * length) for each tube and multiply by two. If it's more than 80% of 0.5m^2 get a second can. I'm not sure how much experience you have with spraying but getting even coverage and avoiding unnecessary overspray takes practice.

schweiz

Also I'm not sure how well Hammerite in tins sprays, it's quite thick stuff. A brush might be a better option. My dad hammerited my first racing bike when I was 12. Silver with 5 speed and 26" wheels and red bar tape...my pride and joy! He did it as a surprise for me one summer, so I didn't see him paint it but I'll bet he used a brush. It was a nice finish. Sadly it ended up under a Seat Marbella whilst I was still attached to the toe-clips (added against my dad's wishes!). Still the compo cheque was nice when I was 18!!

topsey_turvey

Hammerite make an electrostatic sprayer. Mains operated, but charges the paint and the frame so that there is no overspray and a supposedly even coat. Only drawback is that it costs £40. No idea how good it is, but Hammerite always works best if it's quite warm.

77ric

Topsey Turvey wrote:

Hammerite make an electrostatic sprayer. Mains operated, but charges the paint and the frame so that there is no overspray and a supposedly even coat. Only drawback is that it costs £40. No idea how good it is, but Hammerite always works best if it's quite warm.

I have had the privilege of seeing the sprayer in use, and it does actually work. Bloody strangest thing to see as the spray wraps around the item, so no over spray. According to Akzo Nobel's technical peeps one spray cartridge should be enough to spray a common or garden narrow railing fence that is 1 meter high by 11 meters long.

Disclaimer: I Don't work for Akzo Nobel, but I do wholesale some of there products.

By the way the Metal Master is powered by 3 AAs if I remember correctly.

not sure how well it'd work on a frame mind.

Northwind

[quote="schweiz" I'm not sure how much experience you have with spraying but getting even coverage and avoiding unnecessary overspray takes practice.[/quote]

A fair amount with guns- cars and motorbikes- but very little with aerosols. But needs must... I did the surface area calculations but a frame's going to give a lot of overspray since the tubes are narrow, so I don't think that's going to be all that useful as a guide.

Thing is, I know I'll not get amazing results with this, I'm just going for protected and not-ugly, which is more doable- this is going to be a road and play bike, not a showpiece. I've seen that sprayer, it's incredibly cool but if I was going to spend that, I'd spend it on powdercoating tbh.

Hmm. Guess I'll just get 2 cans.

blister pus

I'm pretty sure I've seen those sprayers for hire at a nearby plant hire shop (they do the lot up to cranes) so it would be worth asking around. I'm guessing the hire charge wouldn't be too prohibitive. If I get time I'll try and get a call in and check the details out.

KnightofCydonia

I'd also say it depends how much of a solvent abuser you are. I remember years back my friend decided we'd spraypaint my old BMX gold, but tried to do so in an unventilated shed. Not a good idea

Northwind

blister pus wrote:

If I get time I'll try and get a call in and check the details out.

Thanks for the offer! But it's not really something that fits the plan, like I say the reason for spraying it is to make it as cheap as possible, as soon as I start factoring in hire and colleciton and whatnot I'd be as well off getting my tame powdercoater to stick a stock solid colour on it for £40. But thanks for the offer!

Bit the bullet and bought a couple of cans in tasteful yellow... I was sorely tempted to go with a hammered metallic finish, or for white, but I don't fancy cleaning it! Yellow at least looks good when it's dirty, white just looks dirty. There's a supplier on Ebay that does the cans, delivered, for less than the local shops sell the cans so there's no real issue if I need more.

This is mad, I'm getting more excited about my 16-year-old, £100-budget 21-speed rigid rebuild than I am about my proper bike :roll:

.blitz

Northwind wrote:

How many tins of hammerite does it take to spray a frame?

If it's any help one can of Hammerite will spray a pair of BMX cranks with some left over. It's stayed on apart from a bit of heel rub.

blister pus

There's more than a tinge of self interest in me finding out some more detail about rental, Northwind. :oops: Anyway, just done a random call to a hire place and he said if they stocked it they'd charge what they charge for the other paint spraying kit of similar size, which was a tenner a day, then paint on top. I'll be trying the other one I was thinking of later.

Yellow is a bold choice. Forget white. Black covers a multitude of sins though I think if you take your time with it then you'll get the finish you're after, at least that you can live with.

Northwind

Yeah, I hope so... I could have shot it in 2-pack and got a better-than-showroom finish but to be honest, I just cannot be ****ed It'll get crashed and leaned against lamp-posts and all that so there's not much point in making it great. But I should be able to make it decent, unless the paint's a total blobby mess to spray. Soon find out!

schweiz

Let us know how you get on and post some pics!. I have an old steel frame waiting for a SS conversion.

Northwind

Will do- though it's a way off yet, still need new shifters and my crank's gone back to wooly hat shop for replacement (it's just as well their replacement service is so fast, because their warehouse shippers must be on drugs) but it's coming together. Probably get the paint on towards the end of this week.

schweiz

did you ever paint your frame?

Northwind

It's almost done now... The answer so far is 3, though I could have done it with 2 if I'd not had to redo a fair bit of it, the paint handles very differently from auto paints so it took a while to get to grips with.

I might just run out and have to get a 4th, getting a totally uniform wet finish is pretty tricky, it was easy enough on the forks but not so much on the frame with the size of it- if you spray close enough to get a totally smooth finish, it's easy to get runs. So I'm doing a dust-coat instead for the final finish, which looks and feels lovely, but can't be repaired if I scratch it. Nearly there!

schweiz

is it done yet?

I'm waiting for the nights to draw in before I start a singlespeed conversion of my dad's old bike.

Northwind

Not quite! Forks are done, but someone knocked the frame off the roof hanger when it was nearly done so I've had to redo a fair bit of it But it's almost there. All the other parts are together too... Just need to decide on a name for it now, which thanks to another thread is probably Iron Chicken.

Oh, the answer is 2 if you know what you're doing, since hammerite doesn't spray quite like automotive finishes, it's thicker and heavier so you need to spray deeper, wetter coats to get a smooth finish but that makes it very easy to get sags. So it's taking me 3 as I've been learning its differences as i go and redo parts (and respraying half the damn frame). The yellow needs a LOT of coats to get a uniform colour too, it's a little translucent so until there's 3 or 4 full thickness coats it's quite green because of the metal underneath.

Getting a smooth, consistent finish on the whole thing would be very difficult, so I've gone for a textured dustcoat finish instead, which is actually really nice.

blister pus

What did you end up calling it, after the name competition n'all?

Northwind

Probably Iron Chicken but I change my mind still, it was nearly Chocobo but then with the setback on the painting I had enough time to change my mind 4 or 5 more times

MeddlE

TTIUWP

Come on, get some pics up man, you've had all weekend!

Northwind

Going to be at least another week, probably 2... I can send a pic of the forks if you like